The present invention relates to a photographed image reproducing apparatus which picks up an image photographed in each frame of a film by a photoelectric conversion device and reproduces/displays the picked up image on a television (TV) monitor.
There have been known photographed image reproducing apparatuses which pick up an image photographed in each frame of a film (hereinafter referred to merely as a photographed image) by an image pick-up device such as a charge coupled device (CCD) and reproduce the picked up image on a TV monitor or like display apparatus. In the apparatuses of this type, a gradation characteristic, an outline characteristic, and the like are adjustable so as to adjust the quality of the image reproduced on the TV monitor.
For instance, Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 62-161143 discloses the following photographed image reproducing apparatus. A plurality of gradation correction tables and color correction tables corresponding to a plurality of different types of pictures are stored in advance. A picture of the picked up image is classified based on information including average, maximum and minimum transmission densities and the number of colors such as red, blue, and green. Gradation and color corrections are applied to the picked up image using the gradation and color correction tables corresponding to the classified picture.
Further, Japanese Examined Patent Publication No. 63-38154 discloses the following photographed image reproducing apparatus which displays a picked up image obtained by scanning a photographed image on a TV monitor. Gradation and color information is calculated from the picked up image. The calculation values are compared with predetermined reference values to calculate a scanning condition under which the photographed image is scanned so as to exhibit proper gradation and colors in a reproduced image.
The purpose of the photographing operation differs, which leads to different types of pictures such as a landscape picture, a collective picture including images of many people, a portrait picture and a macrophotographed picture. The quality of an image to be reproduced differs depending on the photographing purpose.
For example, in the case of the macrophotographed picture, it is preferable to emphasize a main subject such as a flower and an insect and to reproduce the main subject image clearly. In the case of the portrait picture, it is preferable to emphasize an image of a person relative to a background image to such an extent as not to damage harmony with the background image and to reproduce the portrait picture such that the main subject image stands out of the background image.
It is well known that characteristics of the photographed image differs depending upon a light source. For example, an image photographed under the tungsten or fluorescent light tends to be unclear compared to the one photographed using the sunlight during the day as a light source. Likewise, an image photographing using the sunlight on a cloudy day is less clear than the one photographed on a fine day.
In the case of a flash firing photographing operation, the amount of light illuminating a subject differs depending upon a distance between the camera and the subject, which leads in some cases to an improper luminance balance between a background image and a subject image in a photographed image. For instance, when a photographed image obtained by photographing a subject standing close to the camera with the assist of flash light is reproduced on a TV monitor, the reproduced subject image looks unnatural, looking particularly whitish relative to the background image.
The reproducing apparatuses disclosed in the above-mentioned references set the contents of the gradation and color corrections based on the information obtained by picking up the photographed image. These apparatuses do not set contents of an image quality correction such as a gradation correction based on data concerning photographing operations recorded in correspondence with respective frames, the data including the focusing accuracy, magnification, light source and exposure level.
With these apparatuses, it may be possible to correct the overall image quality of the reproduced image by correcting the gradation and colors of the photographed image itself, but it is difficult to obtain a proper image quality in consideration of the photographed content, e.g., the time when a landscape picture is taken.
Further, since an image having an extremely large luminance difference is reproduced with an unnatural luminance balance, it is desirable to prepare different gradation characteristics for images in high and low luminance regions and to apply to each region a gradation correction corresponding to the luminance. The above-mentioned references disclose no art of dividing the photographed image into a high luminance region and other region, and correcting the image in each region using a gradation characteristic corresponding to the luminance of the region. Thus, with the apparatuses disclosed therein, it is also difficult to correct a photographed image having a large luminance difference and to reproduce an image having a natural luminance balance.